From: Bob Bartch 
Subject: SNET: Are the pictures real?
Date: 21 May 1999 11:54:34 -0400
To: SNETNEWS 


->  SNETNEWS  Mailing List

Kinda reminds one of the gal who put on the great performance before
Congress to get the US to fight a war in the Gulf.  After the war we
learned the whole thing was a hoax and she was a paid performer (the
niece of the ambassador from Kuwait).


Christiane AmanpourRs CNN Report - A Massacre Right on Schedule?

Original sources
20th May 1999 By: Mary Mostert, Analyst, Original Sources
(www.originalsources.com)

Watching CNN these days is like watching a who-dun-it when youRve
already heard the ending. IRve been receiving a flurry of
e-mail from Macedonian, Russian, Yugoslav and Greek sources telling me
that the publicRs sagging interest in supporting the
senseless bombing will shortly be beefed up with some kind of "burning
the Reichstag" sort of propaganda ploy. Of course,
NATO Bomb supporters were much incensed that I printed those e-mail
which warned that Christiane Amanpour was already
in place in Albania with three camera crews to create the hoped for
public outrage.

So, guess what? Right on schedule we have pictures, no less, taken by an
Albanian who says they prove a massacre in Izbica in
the Drenica Valley of Kosovo. Jamie Shea, NATO spokesman went to great
lengths to try to convince the media that pictures
he had "proved" that there had been a "massacre" at Izbica. What we TV
viewers could see were presumed bodies on the
ground and an overvoice of Christiane Amanpour pumping Albanian refugees
to tell her about the atrocities they had seen.

Back in 1991-92, when "massacres" were being reported from South Africa,
I happened to BE in South Africa. One picture
which went around the world was a photo of bodies lying on the grass in
Johannesburg of blacks who had been killed, it was
reported, by the evil white police of the F.W. DeKlerk government.

The picture showed bodies scattered all over a grassy open place. The
only problem was that the "bodies" were not dead
bodies. They were sleeping bodies. An enterprising cameraman had taken
pictures at midday on the Witwaterrand University
Campus in Downtown Johannesburg when, as usual, a large number of black
students were taking their mid-day nap.

On several occasions I was asked to go to squatter camps to see how
badly black South Africans were treated by the white
regime. Each time I visited a squatter camp - and you really had to
search for them in the black townships - I asked questions
that I note Christiane Amanpour NEVER asks in the Albanian Refugee
camps. My first question was: "Where did you come
from?" and the second question was, "How long have you lived in this
area?" In all my visits to squatter camps I never met a
single South African citizen. The supposedly mistreated South African
blacks invariably came from Mozambique, Zaire, one of
the black homelands, Zimbabwe. They were illegal aliens who had come to
South Africa in hopes of finding a job.

The South African blacks I met in Soweto lived in 2-3 bedroom brick
homes (built by the government) on small lots. I was in
and out of Soweto almost daily for 18 months during a period of time
when the US press was saying that no white people were
EVER allowed in Soweto.

Since the evil white government of South Africa was ousted, have you
read anything about South Africa? Unlikely. CNN
doesnRt cover South Africa any more. Of course, the value of the rand
has dropped more than 50% and unemployment and
crime have skyrocketed - but you never hear about the near anarchy going
on there, or the numbers of white farmers being
killed almost daily. Why? Because the media can no longer make the story
a racial conflict story. The people being killed are
mostly blacks killed by blacks or whites killed by blacks - and
regardless of how many get killed, that doesnRt constitute a
"massacre" for CNN purposes. So, they pretend nothing is happening.
Hundreds of thousands of blacks have died violent
deaths and millions are dying of AIDS, but the Clinton Administration
has been totally unconcerned.

That all may explain why I am skeptical of CNNRs timely "massacre"
stories. We were told there was going to be an Albanian
massacre, reported by Christiane Amanpour for the express purpose of
getting the public worked up so they will support
sending ground troops into Yugoslavia. And, sure enough, right on
schedule, we have massacres - and we have camera crews
claiming to have witnessed them. However, Jamie Shea was having a hard
time with the pictures he was showing trying to
prove any real trauma. What I saw was a man standing in the middle of a
field waving his arms. Shea said he was explaining
that was where the men of the village were killed. Were they KLA? They
said no, even though the men were not young men
because all the young men, Shea said, had "fled into the hills" leaving
their wives and children, apparently, to face the evil Serbs
alone. The men killed were older men - so we were told.

Now, doesnRt that sound like the Albanian men are just great heroes?
Christiane tells us the Serbs come in and rape all the
women and their husbands just flee to the hills and leave their wives
and children to their fate?

Unfortunately, just as Jamie Shea was finishing up on his massacre
story, the latest strike on Belgrade Thursday night was also
reported by Brent Sadler announcing the NATO bombing of a major civilian
hospital in Belgrade, destroying its emergency
wing and the neurological section of the hospital, killing at least
three and, of course, putting the emergency rooms out of
commission. At 1:00 AM, I received, through Vladimir Konecni, a message
from a teacher friend of his in Belgrade who wrote:
"Since yesterday, the sky has been burning. Tonight they hit the Dragisa
Misovic hospital in Dedinge (in Belgrade) and there are
many dead. They hit obstetricsR ward, the operating rooms where Cesarean
sections were being performed and the nursery
where the babies were. Many of the women were cut by flying glass."

Perhaps there was a massacre at Isbica. I certainly could not tell from
the pictures I saw. That, we are told, is a "war crime." I
guess that what is going on over there actually IS a war if there are
war crimes going on. If so, what does the rules of war tell us
about countries that bomb hospitals, schools, embassies (they hit the
Swedish AmbassadorRs home last night) and apartment
buildings? Is that just computer war games, but killing the men who are
the enemy - the KLA and its supporter, THATRs "war
crimes" or "atrocities?"

Over 1300 civilians have been killed by NATO bombs, but Christiane
Amanpour tells us that we ought to get upset over 127
men being shot - men who are in villages supporting the KLA? Men who
flee to the hills to save their own hides and leave their
wives and children to the mercy of killers and rapists (according to
Christiane Amanpour) IsnRt there something really wrong
with this story, even for CNN and Christiane AmanpourRs twisted mind?

Christiane Amanpour said the Izbica situation (and incidentally we as
yet donRt have dead bodies to prove there was a
massacre) was the "worst massacre in Kosovo. Remember, just a few weeks
ago CNN was telling us, through Christiane
Amanpour, that all the Albanians refugees were saying that they were
GLAD that NATO was bombing Kosovo. They want
Kosovo destroyed by bombs, which would certainly indicate they are
enemies of the Yugoslav people, but if the Serbs kill the
men -or make them work - THATRs an atrocity? Something about all this
just doesnRt ring true. Based on NATO reports, most
of the cities and villages of Kosovo are either bombed out by NATO or
burned out by the Serbs looking for KLA terrorists.
This is what the ethnic Albanians wanted? I donRt believe it. I think
Amanpour is trying to sell us a bill of goods.

The other side of the media-horror story war, put forward by Serbia-info
is: "The bestial stupidity was the information about the
American cosmic satellites shoots of the mass graves in the village
Izbica in Kosovo and Metohija with more than 2.500
Albanians in it. If anyone ever believed in that infantile lie, the
brave and risky action of the Radio Television Serbia reporters
changed their minds. The mass grave was the field, plowed one month
before the broadcasting of the news. The satellite which
could count the corpses under the ground if it existed, was the
unbelievable achievement of the science."

It would take a tremendous level of gullibility to believe, at this
point, that our satellites could, as Serbia-info observes, "count
the bodies underground" when we are told that our bombing embassies,
hospitals, schools, Albanian refugees, etc., were the
result of bad intelligence, mistakes, or "accidents."

I know, as a journalist, that the bombing of Yugoslavia has boosted the
number of people watching, listening to and reading the
news. I also know that many Americans are getting burned out by the
horror of it and, as my sister told me yesterday, can no
longer watch it because they are so ashamed of what America is doing.
That has caused a drop in the number of people
watching, listening to and reading the news. The Zogby poll (posted
elsewhere today on this site), also shows a sharp drop in
the number of people in America who are supportive of ClintonRs war and
the stock markets posted sharp drops overnight.

Clinton expected the Americans to follow him and support him if he went
to war, and just forget about impeachment and his
treasonous behavior in apparently trading nuclear secrets and
super-computers for Chinese campaign contributions. But, the
polls are showing a sharp decline in voter support for Clinton.

Expect a sudden breakthrough for diplomacy over bombing in the near
future.

To comment: mmostert@originalsources.com.



-> Send "subscribe   snetnews " to majordomo@world.std.com
->  Posted by: Bob Bartch